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Types of cork floor

Cork floor is very comfortable and beautiful flooring materials option. In addition, cork floor is quiet and reduces impact sound of walking by people or pets. Cork flooring material is naturally anti-microbial and has excellent insulation properties, ensuring minimal heat loss. The manufacturers made it possible by trapping the air inside of the cellular structure of cork material that provides warmth and a natural shock absorbing feel to the floor.

There are different types of cork flooring available on the market.

Solid cork flooring is made 100% of cork from the top to bottom and comes in different sizes and thickness. This type of cork floor can be unfinished and prefinished.

    Unfinished cork floor is a raw flooring product that will need to be treated after installation. That’s why this type of floor has to be sanded and finished after installation. This product can be custom stained to any desire color at a job site. However, it is not a do-it-yourself because this work should be done with an extreme care and knowledge of how cork functions.
    Prefinished cork floor comes already with finish and protective sealer applied by the manufacturer. Nearly all cork flooring comes pre-finished what it significantly reduce the installation time and cost.

Engineered cork floor consist a few layers compressed together and its construction similar to the engineered hardwood floor. Core layer is usually medium density fiberboard (MDF) or high density fiberboard (HDF). Since, HDF is superior to MDF, it is better to choose high density fiberboard for floating or click and lock cork floor. In addition, a cork core has a balancing layer from the bottom and actual cork veneer layer from the top. The underlayment can be installed separately or applied by the manufacturer on every plank or tile. Engineered cork is a factory prefinished product.

Due to its sound adsorption some flooring underlayment are made from cork. The thickness of this product varies from ¼ to ½ of an inch and normally comes in rolls or sheet. Generally the thicker the cork underlayment the more sound absorbent your floor will be. Cork flooring cannot be confused with cork underlayments which are two completely different products.

Mosaic cork floor comes from cork bottle tops. In other words, small pieces of recycled cork from wine bottles attached to the sheets of backing material (mesh paper or fabric) and finished with a water-proof sealer.

Varieties of cork flooring textures can be obtained by cutting the bark of cork oak tree under different angles. There are few ways how manufacturers produce cork floor tile, such as they can cut the cork into smaller tiles or ground it and then combine into a floor tile. In contrast to solid cork flooring, some manufacturers process cork material in order to get some particular patterns. They mix rubber or other materials with cork to get a special texture and colors. Some patterns of cork floor can even resemble plank boards.

There are several types of cork tile thicknesses are available for both residual and commercial applications. Thicknesses of cork flooring vary from ¼ to ¾ depend on manufacturer and type of the product.